The assignment will examine UK clothing retailing. Students are expected to select one leading clothing retailer from this sector (either a top 10 clothing retailer based on sales or a leading pure clothing retailer such as ASOS etc). The assignment will focus on retail logistics and supply chain management issues of the retailer of your choice. Students will analyse retailer’s supply chain operations and identify three key logistics and supply chain management challenges the retailer currently faces within its UK operations. These challenges will be identified following a systematic review of relevant reports, websites and other secondary source material. Subsequently, students will provide appropriate solutions for these challenges.

Therefore, students are asked to:

Task 1: Identify three key challenges the retailer faces. These challenges should be related to the retail logistics and supply chain management material covered in the module. (50% of the mark)

Task 2: Suggest possible solutions in order to tackle these three challenges. These solutions should be related to the retail logistics and supply chain management material covered in the module. (50% of the mark)

2) In task 1, students need to identify three key challenges and justify why they think these are the key ones for the company. They should also discuss how these challenges relate to the retail logistics and supply chain management operations. For task 2, students need to provide one relevant solution minimum per challenge.

3) Students should choose a clothing retailer. However, it will be acceptable to choose a generic retailer (e.g. Marks and Spencer, John Lewis etc) as long as the assignment focuses on the retailer’s clothing product range and relevant supply chain operations.

4) Your analysis should be a thorough and detailed one and not just a description of facts. For both tasks, students should build their arguments upon the lectures and other relevant academic material from textbooks and journals such as, inter alia, the following: International Journal of Operations and Production Management, Supply Chain Management: An International Journal, International Journal of Physical Distribution and Logistics Management, Journal of Enterprise Information Management.

5) Students should also consult relevant company sources, websites and other secondary data sources (e.g. reports). For both tasks, students must make a critical, thorough and detailed use of that material in the arguments / challenges / solutions stated.

6) The analysis should be well-structured and should contain the following elements: a Section related to Task 1, a Section related to Task 2, a Concluding Section, a Reference List, and Appendices (if appropriate).

7) Where specific ideas, arguments, models, information, etc are drawn on in your discussion, the author and date of the source text should be included in the body of your discussion. All quotations should be clearly acknowledged and sourced including page references. Full details of all source material should also be included in the Reference List.